Monthly Archives: June 2015

The blonde beauty queen sits on the sands of a secluded lake front. Alone in the dark, she counts the number of waves thrashing violently. The cool wind occassionally blows her wavy hair into a mess, but she does nothing to straighten it out. At least, not when no one sees her in the dark.

She tucks her legs into her chest and hugs them tightly, head down on her knees. She counts the waves, but doesn’t look up at the moonlight.

The waves begin to calm. Ten minutes later, the woman still sits in the fetal position, her tears dropping through her legs and onto the sand. A young man on a canoe notices the woman on the sand and thinks to yell to her, but for some reason, no sound comes out. So he paddles closer, just enough to clearly see the woman under the moonlight. The wavy blonde hair. The red athletic shorts and fragile legs. The gray sweatshirt that’s too big for her small frame.

He knows this girl, but from where? Should he say something?

She continues to weep, pretending not to hear his footsteps. She pretends not to have gotten a glimpse of familiar tan and muscular legs. Just from the sound and the subtle glance, she knows who he is. But she says nothing.

The wind starts to pick up again, the moonlight dimming. He gets out of the canoe to push it back into the water. Better head home, he thinks. So he quickly paddles off, flexing his muscular arms to race against soon-to-be-violent waves.

When he gets to the other side, he looks back. She’s probably still there, he thinks.

And she is, once again listening to the thrashes. She’s heard noises similar to this a million times before…pretty much every day.

Right before the moon completely dims, her cell phone goes off, the sound of angry rap overpowering the waves.

Shut up, Brian! her mind screams. She doesn’t dare answer the phone.

Why did Jake come up to me? she wonders. It’s been five years since we saw each other. No, we weren’t in the same crowd. Maybe he didn’t recognize me. But he could have at least said something.

As she thinks about the “whys”, she stands up, picks up her cell phone from the sand, and throws it into the lake. Slightly satisfied, she sits back down and folds her hands, silently praying to God to give her the courage to end her current relationship.

Even if it means one more violent fight, it would be worth it to just see Jake one more time, to see him clearly under the moonlight.

The Bible as Lit. class was made up of maybe 30 college students. Some of them took the class out of interest. Others took it just for credits. They all used the English Standard Version Bible. They all wrote essays and took short-answer and multiple-choice quizzes and tests. The professor emphasized on themes, basic concepts, and details from all of the books, especially the gospels.

I was in this class, intrigued by different themes, wanting to absorb all of the information “at once.” Given that I had some knowledge about different books in the Bible before I took the class, the essays and tests weren’t hard. But the quizzes that had questions about names and dates and specific events in one book were hard for me.

See, before taking the class, I had an intense interest in not just everything biblical, but the writing style as well. It was hard to just read for facts when I paid so much attention to style.

I realized that by focusing on so many things while trying to read fast (just enough to take in general themes and writing styles), it was easier to miss important facts. By the end of the class, I learned that it’s best to just read little by little and really dig into the concepts. Maybe it would have been more beneficial to read 2 verses, take a break, and read 4 more verses until I understood everything and completed the assignments.

Nevertheless, I did well in the class because it was about a topic of sincere interest. My prior knowledge helped. But the whole time I was reading and studying for tests and quizzes, God was teaching me that there was so much I still had to learn. There was so much I had to learn about reading the Bible so deeply that I could truly grasp the messages and apply them to my life. Now that I’m done with the class, I can go through the books again…a few verses at a time.

At church today, there was a baptism of a baby girl. (For confidentiality, we’ll call her Kaitlyn).

The pastor and four adults (the parents and their sponsors) gathered around the alter. Kaitlyn’s mother held her loud baby as the pastor was giving the blessing.

The whole time the five adults (the pastor, the parents, and the sponsors) gathered around the alter, I thought…She’s so tiny, so young! And they’re blessing her now, before she can even talk.

I was awestruck, watching Kaitlyn squirm in her mother’s arms and cry as the pastor ran water upon her forehead in the shape of a cross.

This scene almost made me cry. My parents had all 5 of my siblings and I baptized at an early age. I don’t really remember my baptism, but I do remember one of my siblings being an infant. The child was surrounded by my parents and “many” extended family members.

That was the first baptism I remember. It was a huge deal to my parents. At the time, I was too young to understand why.

But during Kaitlyn’s baptism, I truly recognized the beauty in the blessing of the cross, the first stage to accepting God. Parents have their children baptized early so that they can grow with a foundation of faith, a foundation of belief.

This is beautiful because not every child gets baptized so early in life. Those who do get baptized early have their whole lives to truly understand baptism and blessings. Not every child has that chance. In fact, some people don’t get baptized at all because their parents never showed the importance of it.

My siblings and I are so blessed to have been baptized at such a young age with so much thought, planning, and love from our parents.

After Kaitlyn’s baptism was over, I thought about the service and my memories and thought…When I have a child, he or she will get baptized at a young age.